1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to horseshoes, and more particularly to horseshoes made of an elastomeric material such as a synthetic rubber, natural rubber, etc., which have a plurality of discrete or continuous recesses of an elongated shape designed to accomodate nails on a surface facing the ground thereof.
2. Prior Art
It has long been a common practice to apply horseshoes made of metal to the hoofs of a horse in order to protect them from cracking and accidental injuries. The conventional method of putting such metal horseshoes on the hoofs of a horse is that one of the horseshoes is registered or positioned correctly upon the bottom surface of a hoof and is then fixed against the bottom of the hoof by driving nails into the hoof from the bottom surface of the tread or the surface facing the ground of the horseshoe in such a manner that the nails may penetrate through the hoof in a slightly outwardly slanted fashion with their end tips exposed slightly out of the side surface of the hoof, and thereafter having the exposed end tips of the nails bent so as to prevent the nails and hence the horseshoe from deviating from the desired position and thus locking it into the desired position. However, when using such a conventional method of fixing the horseshoes on the hoofs of a horse, it would naturally be essential to renail the horseshoes each time they are replaced, thus resulting in many nail holes being left in the hoofs. This eventually leads to no room being left for renailing into the hoof.
Particularly, in the case of the race horse, it is common that a horseshoe of a relatively wide type, generally call "flat shoes", are normally put on and are set on the hoof by use of nails while they are red hot. At the time of the horse race, however, it is necessary to replace those flat shoes with ones having a relatively narrow width and which are made of a light alloy, which are generally called "race shoes". Consequently, it is generally inevitable that the cycle of replacing horseshoes on a race horse is far more frequent than in comparison to that of normal farm horses or the like.
In this respect, it is natural for the race horses which often take part in races, to accumulate many lock nail holes in their hoofs in a relatively short period of time, so that it would be difficult to put the horsehoes on. With the hoofs being in such a condition, there would be a high possibility of dropping a horseshoe or cracking a hoof or hoofs during a race. Should a horseshoe be dropped during a race, it would be very possible that the race horse would not only get its hoof injured, but also may even break that leg. As is generally known, once a race horse breaks its leg, on many occasions, there is no better choice other than a mercy killing. The dropping of a horseshoe during a race does not only bring the possibility of shortening the life of the race horse but often also causes the jockey to fall from the horse, and this occasionally results in his injury or even death.
More particularly, the conventional horseshoes made of metal are usually relatively heavy in weight, and thus create an undesired effect of substantial impacts or shock loads upon the leg joints of a horse while going on foot. In this respect, it would be harmful and dangerous for the horses wearing such conventional metal horseshoes to gallop or walk on relatively hard ground. Such risks would still exist even in the case of relatively soft ground.
Therefore, it has long been desired to have the conventional metal horseshoes improved thereby eliminating such drawbacks inherent thereto. The present invention is essentially directed toward the improvement of the metal horseshoes to meet the above-mentioned requirements.